Daily Yellowstone journal., 1887-07-09
LAzv LIFE IN EGYPT.
How the Gisours Enjoy Themselves st
a Catrene Hotel.

"
How the Gisours Enjoy Themselves at
n Catrene Hotel.
Cairo, with its strange history and
stranger streets, its mosques and bazars,
is a charming study. All nations meet
here: all languages and all customs OBJ
tain here, and of wonderful costumes
and merchandise there is no end. In
this sweetest of winter climates life
seems too short to be in q hurry; indeed,
it is not worth living unless one can
loiter. The donkeys and cats alone
would make a lifelong study; when they
lift up their voices either singly or in
concert, the very stars in heaven quake,
and the moon turns pale and trembles.
And then there are the people who own
the cats and who ride the donkeys-
several decades might be devoted to
them. An Egyptian woman Is an OBJ
iect when ON foot; but when she mounts
a donkey she is a vision! To begin with,
she rides on both sides of the animal,
and when her curious black drapery
bags out in the wind. and the donkey
disappears, save that his big ears and
small legs twinkle occasionally into view,
sensations fade. words fail and one feels
the need of rest and nourishment. Dodg-
ing under camels: stepping over dogs
and children; pushing aside donkeys and
people. one finds a narrow alley leading
off the Mouskee, and seeming to wind its
tortuous way into strange places. One
or two smaller alleys turn off; then be-
fore you rises a low arched way. The
shadow is very deep; you are evidently
under a house. and a keen wind, like
that i'm a narrow mountain defile, nearly
takes your hat off. A wide gate stands
open; one moment takes you through,
past the group Of guardian Arabs; you
turn a corner. and before You opens the
beautiful garden of the hotel.
Sycamores and acacias bend and droop
over the flower beds; roses and ler de
Tvs wave IN the wind; great bamboos,
more than forty feet high, sway with a
long. slow motion; the red hibiscus burns
like fire in the green gloom; the shadowy
palms whisper softly to the fresh wind
coming in from the desert; the little wag
tails hop about the path; the doves
MOURN their hearts out in the tree tops:
the cloudless, rainless sky spreads blue
above. and the sun comes down be-
tween the leaves in a thousand golden
streams.
Occasionally the sweet stiffness is dis
turbed by a personally conducted
mob; but fortunately not often. People
who know how to live in Egypt come
here and life goes on as il should in the
land of the lotus. Excursions are made
easily; sights are seer intelligently; there
is quiet talk and peaceful thought here
i'm the fragrant garden. An artist paints
with his Arab and Fellah models grouped
in the sunshine on the piazza; further on
an Englishman sits translating an Arab
book: still further down the vine draped
vista some Arab sheyks are bargaining
with knowing Psychologists for antiques
-scarabs and ugly little gods-strange
old rings and Coptic embroideries.
Down in the garden the artists wife
and an American woman drum softly on
darabukkah. while on the path in front
of them a Fellah girl kneels, trying faith
fully to teach them a native song. Strange
and wild it is, with an unaccountable
measure that can only be caught by ear,
not learned by method. Near by a con-
juror does his marvellous tricks, his mys-
terious call of gala, galla!' now and
then rising above the low barbaric song.
An East Indian merchant, with his rich
stuffs spread over chairs and benches, his
gold and silver wares glittering in the sun
light, charters persuasively with a group
of people, who try vainly to look suf-
fciently Indifferent to make him lower
his prices. The monday sun is blazing
overhead; the birds are still, and the roses
droop a little, but sitting quietly in the
| shade is not so bad, and the desert wind
coming over the garden Of aneighborine
sheyk, has a crisp. cool touch to il. Later
the scene dissolves. and the company &c
their different ways. to meet again after
dinner under the broad fall of moonlight.
Then cigars and talk Of the days doings,
stories of odd adventures, stories of sold
times when they first came down into
Egypt, and so the pleasant days drift by.
Cairo Cor. Louisville Courier journal.